Bureau of Reclamation commissioner:
Agreement offers more tools

H&N photo by Ty Beaver Michael Connor, commissioner
of the U.S. Bureau of Reclamation, says the Klamath
Basin Restoration Agreement gives water managers more
tools.

by Ty Beaver, Herald and News 1/27/10

The commissioner of the U.S. Bureau of
Reclamation called the Klamath Basin Restoration Agreement a
great opportunity to change the dynamic in the Basin and
create a better path to the future.

Michael Connor was in the Basin Tuesday to meet with
regional Bureau officials and others and view parts of the
Klamath Reclamation Project’s infrastructure.

Following are his responses to questions about the
restoration agreement and its impact on the Project:

Q: What would be the impact to the Project’s
water supplies in the interim before the restoration
agreement is fully implemented? What about in the long term?

A: Connor said the restoration agreement provides a
number of tools to help manage water until the document is
fully implemented, including committing more resources to
the region and working with irrigators to develop a water
management plan.

“We’ll have more at our discretion,” he said.

The long-term approach would involve stakeholders and other
experts using scientific data to determine how much water is
needed for fisheries, the lake and irrigation, and
irrigators would have to be part of that process. That
process will create more certainty for the water supply, he
said.

Q: How does this restoration agreement compare
to others concluded throughout the West?

A: Connor said the document is complicated and is uniquely
designed to work for the Klamath Basin.

“It’s complex, but a lot of others have been complex,” he
said.

He noted that water settlements in Arizona and other places
have involved issues such as affordable power and even the
need to turn more control of water resources to local
agencies, as the restoration agreement calls for.

Q: This agreement will require a lot of funding.
What is the likelihood that appropriations in the required
amounts will actually occur?

A:Connor said securing funding for efforts such as this are
always tough, but he said his office has already had
conversations with President Barack Obama’s administration
and is eager to start speaking to Congress about it.

Congress found creative ways to fund legislation in the
past, and he is confident a similar arrangement can be found
for the restoration agreement.

He noted that none of the other water settlements the Bureau
was involved with failed because of lack of funding.
Instead, failure came because something else fell through
during implementation.

Q: The restoration agreement is a 50-year
contract. Do you see it being renewed 50 years down the
road? Why or why not?

A: “Fifty years is a long time and speculation on my part to
say what will happen,” Connor said.

But aspects of the agreement will last beyond that 50-year
time frame, he added, and if the agreement works like it
should, those involved will view it as valuable tool and
want to see it continue.